


I'll Bring the Sun

by gunpowdereyes



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-27
Updated: 2011-01-27
Packaged: 2018-01-24 01:43:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1587038
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gunpowdereyes/pseuds/gunpowdereyes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It starts with the end.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Liralen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Liralen/gifts).



> I want to say this was for a mini-big bang? I definitely know this was for Liralen. Post-trade fic.

March, 2008. Prelude.  
  
When I get traded, my first real thought isn’t about my family. After a blur of goodbyes, stupid tears that I’m too tired to be ashamed of, a flurry of phone calls and interviews, a long flight and finally checking in to the hotel in this strange new city, I don’t think about Ottawa. I don’t consider my house, or my parents, or even the team, who will play their next game without me as if I never existed. When I fall into bed, confused, exhausted, a little bit heartsick, I don’t try to imagine what it will be like to go to a new rink tomorrow and realize that this is not temporary. Instead, I think, _I miss Jason_.  
  
What the fuck.  
  
CHAPTER 1  
  
So, like a good third of the female population and likely more of the male population of Ottawa than I’d care to think about, I’ve slept with Jason Spezza. Unlike those people, I’ve slept with Jason Spezza a lot. Like a lot a lot. Like . . . since Binghamton. The first time. Early on.  
  
I’m still not sure exactly how it started. He was there, and I was there, and neither of us is gay –- or, well, I guess it’s hard to say you’re not even a little bit gay after years of sex with a guy, but I still like girls and it’s hard to believe that Jason doesn’t too. I heard him talk once about fluid sexuality, and it made sense at the time, but at the time we were also both incredibly stoned. I bet if I asked him about that now, he’d ask me if that meant sex in a swimming pool.  
  
I remember what happened the first time, though it doesn’t exactly explain “how.” We were out with the team after a win. He was extra friendly all night, but not in any way that raised a flag. Looking back I think he sat a little bit too close to me in the booth at the club, but there were a bunch of us. Pothier sat pretty close to me on the other side, and he definitely didn’t have anything else in mind. Jason and I shared a cab, and he got out at my place because it was close enough to walk to his own. He sat too close to me in the car too; he must have, because afterwards I struggled to remember everything I could about that night, and all I could conjure up was the smell of stale smoke, the cold vinyl seat, and his leg, pressed warm against mine. I think he made fun of my accent when I tried to count out the right change for the driver – that sounds like him. We got out and I asked him in for another drink, and all of a sudden his hand was down my pants and my girlfriend was in Quebec, and it felt good, and that was the beginning of that. He went home before dawn, and when I saw him at practice a couple of days later not a single thing had changed between us. I knew he remembered; he only got blackout drunk once, and he passed out at ten, and we all drew on him with permanent marker for being such a lightweight. The point is, he knew what he was doing, and so did I.  
  
What messed me up wasn’t that it happened, but how little it bothered me. It didn’t feel crazy or wrong. It felt like something that other people shouldn’t know about, but only because they wouldn’t get it. Then it happened again a couple of weeks later, and that was the beginning of that. It was a thing that wasn’t ever a _thing_ , if that makes any sense. Maybe that’s why it’s always been so easy to deal with it. Except for being careful to not get caught, there’s nothing TO deal with.  
  
I do miss him now that I’m gone, but I think that must be normal. I miss all of them. I can’t remember a time before coming to rink meant watching Spezza obsessively taping his sticks, and Kelly having long and boring conversations with himself, and Neil and Fisher hanging out and talking about shooting things, and Alfie looking as if he’d rather kill you than talk to you in the last hour before a game. (He wouldn’t; he was still just as friendly as ever. It was just a crazy Swedish glaring thing.) I got so used to watching other people leave. I got so used to panicking that it would be me and staying instead, that it feels like a cruel joke that it really was me this time.  
  
The worst thing is that I know what it’s like, because I’ve been on the other side of it so many times, to watch your friend get traded. It’s sad, and you miss him, and for a few days the new guy seems out of place and the whole room seems a little bit off, but after a couple of days it’s just . . . the new normal. You still say ‘hi’ to the old guys when you play against them, but a team is a team, and trades are part of it. If it didn’t work that way then I guess Columbus would suck extra hard for me, but it’s still hard to think about them just getting over me. Somebody new in my stall, next to Jason’s, listening to him blather on and on about what move worked for him last game, or how nobody understands his diet but it really is revolutionary, or how he’s watching all of his _Simpsons_ DVDs again, and he’s ready to quote all of the jokes for the fourth time. And even though it had been an awful season, and we’d all argued and shouted and sulked, it still felt like something we had to do together, you know? Something we’d have figured out and been the better for it. And now I’m not going to part of that. Or I guess I am, just in all the wrong ways.  
  
And I’m trying not to think about it because it isn’t even close to what should be on my mind, but I know there’s not going to be anyone like Jason in Columbus. The whole reason it worked for us was because we were on the same page about everything. We didn’t take risks, we didn’t ever talk about it – to each other, and definitely not to anyone else -- and there were no feelings involved. Nothing messy at all, just good friends and good sex. When I was with her, it didn’t even feel like cheating on my girlfriend, even though I knew she wouldn’t understand. No one else would, but we did, and that’s why it worked. I’d never go looking for that here, even though the anonymity is so much higher. I don’t think it’s the kind of thing you can search out, anyway –- not to have it be like that.  
  
I sound like such a girl. Disgusting.  
  
===  
  
I forget all of that after the first few days in Columbus. Everyone’s really nice, and it doesn’t take long for me to get ideas about everything from good places to eat to nice apartments for rent. I get points in all of my first four games, and even if I’m not sure what the hell I’m doing, it’s slowly sinking in that they’re genuinely happy to have me here, and that they want me to be a big part of the team. I’m so used to feeling like I have to fight for everything.  
  
Jason calls one night, way too late after a game, probably because he thinks I’m in a different time zone. I wasn’t asleep anyway. As usual, the word “hello” doesn’t occur to him. Instead, I get “You dead of boredom yet?”  
  
“Nope. You dead of stupid yet?”  
  
He laughs, and it turns out that that still makes me smile hundreds of kilometres away. “I was going to say no, but I totally locked my keys in my car again today.”  
  
“Again? Jason, that’s like four times this year!”  
  
“Three!” He says defensively. “And I was on the phone today, what was I supposed to do? Razor was yelling at me all the way from Russia. That’s distracting!”  
  
“Oh, really? How’s he? And that’s still not a very good reason.”  
  
“It is too, and he’s still in Russia. He’s cold and he’s bitchy. Same as ever.”  
  
“Good to know they have not broken him, anyway.” Jason agrees that that will never happen, and we lapse into silence. “So . . . did you miss me so much you had to call?”  
  
He laughs again, but differently, almost as if he’s nervous. He’s probably just tired. “Oh, you know, we barely remember you already. I had a whole line of people ready to kill to get your stall, and I hear Kells is having a competition for a new roommate.” It’s obviously a joke, but I’m surprised by how much the thought of it hurts. “Nah, the guys were talking about you today, so I volunteered to check up on you. Leclaire turned up today, too. He said you seriously might die of boredom, so look out.”  
  
“Well, he’s wrong.” I sound irritated – I _am_ irritated, rising to it all of a sudden, on behalf of Columbus or at Leclaire or at Jason, or all of the above. “It’s not so bad here at all. The city’s nice and all of the guys are real friendly. And going to the playoffs is a nice change.” I don’t know why I said that, either. I can tell by the short huff of breath on the other end of the line that Jason thinks it’s a low blow. It is.  
  
“Right, well.” He’s short and clipped now, and I try to figure out how to take it back without sounding like an even bigger idiot. He doesn’t give me the chance, though. “I gotta go, but uh. Listen, I’m glad for you. I think everybody is.” The worst thing is that I can tell that he means that.  
  
“Thanks. . . . Thank you for calling. It means a lot,” I say, and hang up, hoping he knows that I meant that too. I set my alarm, shut off the light, and close my eyes to the eighth day of my new life.


	2. Chapter 2

As the end of the season approaches, I have a roommate (Jared Boll), I’ve scored (more than once. Several times), and a very cute girl gave me her number (which I lost somewhere between a bar and a cab, but never mind).  
  
I’ve also found a new place. It’s boring and basic, with beige walls and worn hardwood floors and a dent behind the bathroom door where it looks as if someone threw a punch and missed, but it’s a quiet building, it already had furniture, and it’s a direct enough route to the rink so I won’t get lost. It doesn’t feel like home, but it probably shouldn’t yet, and half of my stuff is still in Ottawa anyway. It’s funny to realize how much I can miss stupid stuff, like a bookcase that was arranged exactly the way I liked it, or the coffee pot whose water measure was somehow half a cup off, and now I make way too much in a new one, or how it was a perfect straight shot from my bed to the bathroom, so that when I stumbled out of bed on dark mornings in the middle of winter, I never walked into a wall. Okay, one time I did, but I think I was still drunk from the night before.  
  
I’ll rescue what I can this summer and I guess I’ll have to sell the rest with the house, and maybe after that’s sorted out I’ll find somewhere more permanent here. But it’s hard to even imagine that part, so I just don’t.  
  
My parents have made plans to come down for the playoffs. I'm not supposed to know they're coming, because my dad thinks we won’t get in if he plans for it, but I found out from my sister. I think Dad’s right, so I appreciate the silence and will act appropriately surprised when the time comes. I don't think I'll have to pretend to be excited.  
  
I still wake up confused sometimes, but it’s happening less and less. I found a decent sushi restaurant and a place with good bratwurst, although I still can’t eat that without thinking about the time Schubie insisted on making it at a team party while he was blind drunk, and only Meszaros would eat the terrifying result. This is me, adjusting.  
  
===  
  
We shut out Calgary at home in front of a nice crowd, and okay, I didn’t have any points, but it was so awesome that I’m still buzzing from it when I get back to my apartment. The guys want to go out to celebrate, and even though I’m tired enough to sleep for a week, I said I’d meet them. It’s almost April already, and as stupid as it sounds, the more we bond before the playoffs, the better. Jason always says that socializing is next to Godliness, but I think that might be bastardizing something his mom told him once. Either way he had the right idea, and I want the new guys to know I’m a team player. Or a team drinker, in this case. Close enough.  
  
I won’t pretend that I’m not still keeping an eye on the Senators -- it’s hard not to when the TVs at home and at the rink are only ever tuned to sports stations, and the fact that I have control over one of those is irrelevant -– but I swear that I’ve mostly stopped thinking about them. There are too many other things going on.  
  
So when Jason turns up at my door five minutes before I’m ready to go out, I honestly don’t know what to do.  
  
“What are you doing here?” I blurt at him, brilliantly.  
  
He comes as close as he ever has to blushing, which is a feat. Maybe I’ll congratulate myself for that when I’m less confused. “I don’t know.” He looks down the hall as if he’s searching for inspiration. “I’ve got a couple of days off, and we were in Raleigh, and I saw a flight here. And I was bored. It just kind of happened. So . . . how’s Columbus? And can I come in?”  
  
Well, that makes even less sense than usual. “Columbus is fine,” I say, which is information he’s been told on the phone. Several times. “And uh. I was just. No, sure, yeah.”  
  
“I don’t have to,” he says, taking a step backwards.  
  
“No, it’s fine. It’s cool. It’s good to see you.” It’s amazing to see him; it’s ridiculous and unspeakably strange. It’s a lot of things, but “good” feels like one of them.  
  
He smiles then and slips past me, dropping his shoulder bag beside my shoes and looking around. “S’a pretty nice place.”  
  
I shrug, glancing around. This apartment is decent at best, and I’m sure Jason thinks so too, but he’s, well, “too nice to say so” doesn’t sound right, but maybe someone taught him manners in the three weeks I’ve been gone. “It’s all right. I’ll find something better next year.” He makes an odd face at that, but doesn’t comment further.  
  
“So you must have been going out,” he says, gesturing to my outfit, and I glance down self-consciously. “You can go ahead, I was just gonna say hi.”  
  
Sure, he flew to Columbus to say hi in person. Jason, who singlehandedly keeps at least three phone companies in business. “I was not going anywhere,” I lie, shaking my head at him when he looks skeptical. “I always look like this! You just forget already.” I briefly weigh the option of still going and taking him with me, because I’m sure it would technically be fine, but how would I ever explain why he’s here in the first place? I don’t even know the answer to that myself.  
  
He grins and sits down, kicking up his feet as if he owns the place. Typical. I suddenly notice that the couch looks faded with the bright lights on, and I wish I’d bought a new one. “Can I get you something?”  
  
“Water’s fine,” he says. I turn the corner for the kitchen, and when I come back with two glasses, he’s sitting cross-legged in front of my TV, surrounded by a stack of games. He glances up. “To tell you the truth, I’m here ‘cause now that you’re gone I can’t kick anybody’s ass at 2K9. Turns out everybody else I know is actually good at it. You up for a beating?”  
  
I stand over him and respond politely by pouring his water on his head. He jumps up, sputtering and swearing, and I just have time to set down the glasses before he’s chasing me through the apartment –- which is not nearly big enough for me to get away in time. “You fucker, come here!” He yells, and I can hear in his voice that he’s laughing, but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything better for me. I almost evade him, darting for the bedroom, but he catches up before I can get the door locked and tackles me to the floor.  
  
He’s breathing hard from laughing and the effort of trying to pin me. I try to hit him, then tickle him, then to throw him off, but bucking underneath him is the wrong strategy, because just like that I’m hard, and there’s no way to avoid him feeling it. It suddenly occurs to me that I haven’t gotten laid since, well, the last time I had sex with Jason. Which was almost exactly a month ago. Not that I’ve been counting.  
  
He pins my hands beside my head and shifts deliberately, and when I groan I think I see something like triumph flare in his eyes before he closes them and kisses me. Then he’s working open my pants, and it’s rough and fast and desperate, and he’s all teeth and bruises. I think he sucks a mark on my throat that will be hard to hide tomorrow, which isn’t like him, but I could care less. I jerk when he gets his hand on my dick, but I want him too badly to be embarrassed, and he seems to be too caught up to notice anyway. He’s whispering, he never stops talking, but I can’t quite make out what he’s saying and I think it all translates to “want” anyway.  
  
“Wait, fuck, fuck everything . . .” I can’t find a condom, my brain has shorted out and I can’t even think where to start to look. But Jason scrambles up to find his bag, and comes back with a full box. And lube. Which means that he flew all the way to Columbus to get laid. Best guy _ever_.  
  
===  
  
Much later, we’ve made it to my bed and are having a nothing conversation about basketball. Jason got free courtside tickets to a Raptors game last week, and he’s trying to convince me, with little success, that Bosh is ready to be a number one guy. All of a sudden he stops talking (arguing) and puts on that fidgety look that he gets when he’s uncomfortable. I watch him, curious. “What?”  
  
“Should I . . . am I sleeping here?”  
  
Oh. I hadn’t thought of that. Is it weird that after years of sleeping together, we’ve never actually _slept_ together? As long as dozing off doesn’t count (and it doesn’t), not once. It’s not as if we’ve ever talked about it, because even when it’s been an option, it hasn’t really been an option. Why take stupid risks and ruin everything over some big misunderstanding? We’ve never roomed together for exactly that reason. Or it was that reason for me, and I assume the same is true for Jason. It’s always been unspoken, but it’s one of those lines that isn’t crossed.  
  
So I just expected him to get up to go eventually, because he’s in my apartment (and those are the rules), but . . . it occurs to me now that we’re in Columbus. No one even knows that he’s here, let alone cares if he stays. I stare back at him, trying to imagine what it might be like, to wake up right next to him tomorrow morning. What if he cuddles? He probably doesn’t, because usually when he hangs around for a little bit afterward we’re just kind of like this, arms and legs against each other, and talking as if we’re at the rink, but _what if he cuddles_?  
  
I can tell that Jason’s having a similar thought process because his eyes have gotten wide, and he’s starting to move. “Never mind, I totally forgot I booked a room at the Hyatt.” He’s not looking at me anymore, which would mean that he was lying even if it wasn’t blatantly obvious. But I can’t decide if I mind.  
  
That night I dream that he stayed.  
  
===  
  
He calls me when he gets up. I hesitate, trying to decide if I should answer or not, but it’s not too weird, right? I’m the reason he’s in Columbus, which is definitely the weird part, but somehow, knowing that he came just for sex makes it much more acceptable.  
  
“Hey, were you up?” Then, before I can answer, “I guess you were because I guess you guys had practice this morning or something –- or no, I forgot you said it was an off day, but anyways, the food here’s shit and I figured you’ve been here long enough to get me some good omelettes at least, so we should go someplace. I mean, I could meet you somewhere. I figured, if you want at least.”  
  
Jesus. I give him a second to make sure he’s actually stopped and not just pausing to breathe, but he seems to be done. I was not up, for the record. “Uh. Sure, there is a good place not too far from the Hyatt --“  
  
“Oh, I uh, meant the Marriott.” It’s hard not to laugh, but I manage it.  
  
“Oh, well, close enough. I can meet you there. Give me an hour?”  
  
So we go out for breakfast. No one has any idea who we are. Jason flirts with me the whole time, I guess just because he’s Jason and he rarely turns down the chance to do something he shouldn’t when he’s positive he can get away with it. In that light, I’m surprised he didn’t stay last night.  
  
I let him go for it now, almost enjoying the way he brushes his knee against mine beneath the table. But I don’t know if I like the whole deal -- it’s unnerving, really, to have all of that attention focused on me. He never does this. _We_ never do this. I invite him back to my place again, and he says yes, and he fucks me up against the front door when we’re inside. Which is a lot more like it. 


	3. Chapter 3

The playoffs come and go in a blur. We get absolutely demolished by Detroit; only game four is even close. It doesn’t seem as if it should hurt this much. Not for me, at least; not when I’ve been here such a short time, but it _does_. I know it’s crazy, but I feel as if I somehow failed them. And everyone’s saying all of the right things about being a young team and needing experience, and I’ve heard all of that before, and there’s some helpless part of me that still feels as if I’m thatclose. On a team that didn’t even make the playoffs, I know. I know.  
  
I have to believe that this is different. We'll be different. That's why it's called a fresh start. When we clear out, a reporter refers to me as a leader going forward, a vet, and I try not to choke on my water and give a decent answer, but I fail a bit at both. Not because I’m upset by it, though. Completely the opposite.  
  
I don’t talk to anyone from Ottawa. A couple of guys call and I don’t pick up, because I just can’t quite do it yet. I know that Jason would have something stupidly appropriate to say, and when I see that he’s one of the Senators going to the Worlds in Switzerland, I call to congratulate him, because I bet that it’s secretly a great consolation prize for him. I know how badly he wants to make the Olympics next year. But I get his voicemail and he doesn’t call back. I guess he’s busy. I guess this is the way it is: we really will fall out of touch. I just didn’t expect it to happen this early, especially after he came here. For days after he left I kept stupidly expecting to get a call, or a text, or _something_. Maybe he finally got it out of his system, and that was that.   
  
I’m still awake early enough to watch their games, and I can still read the disappointment in Jason’s face when they lose in the gold medal game. I stare at my phone for 20 minutes before I dial Fisher’s number and ask him to pass along my “sorry” to all of them.   
  
I hang around Columbus, suddenly not anxious to get home. I go see matinees by myself; dumb, forgettable movies. I go to the zoo. I walk around downtown and don’t get lost once. It’s progress of a kind, and I’ll take anything I can get.   
  
===  
  
I'm at the airport to take a flight home, and a few hours later I’m at Jason’s door instead. I don't know how it happened, or what could have possibly made me believe that it was a good idea. I think "because I'm an idiot" is probably the answer to both. I don’t knock for a minute, because I don’t even know if I should. What if he’s not home? What if he’s not even in town? What if he’s busy? What if –- well, let’s face it, it’s 11 at night and it’s summer. If he’s home, I probably don’t want to walk in on whoever he’s doing in there. He obviously doesn’t want to see me, or I’d have heard from him.   
  
On the other hand, he was willing to turn up on my door because he was horny, and so I ring the bell anyway, because I’ve never been the fastest learner and I just paid for a fucking flight. I stand there like a dummy for a few minutes, and am about to start knocking or give up when he opens the door, and then we stare at each other like dummies instead.  
  
"Antoine?" He's squinting at me as if he needs me to confirm that it is me, and isn’t, I don’t know, maybe some other guy wearing a mask?  
  
“Yes?" I clear my throat. "Hi."   
  
"What -- why -- hi. Come in." He steps aside, and I walk inside, feeling stupider by the minute. This is quickly becoming a trend.   
  
"I tried to call," I tell him, which isn’t entirely true, "but my phone died. I just was in town” –- false -- “and figured I’d stop by and see if you wanted to hang out or something." This isn’t entirely a lie. He’s fun to hang out with, it’s just not number one on my priority list.  
  
He’s Jason, so he doesn’t ask questions, not even "why do you have a suitcase," but just kind of nods as if he’s either totally confused or totally buys it. Probably both. "Oh, s’no problem, I was just asleep." That might even have been true, he looks distinctly rumpled. Bizarre. "Can I get you anything?"  
  
"Do you have anything to get me?" I ask cautiously, and he gives me that sideways grin, because we both know that his fridge is probably full of scary healthy food that I’d never touch in a million years.  
  
"I had a party last night," he says, which at least explains why he’s so tired, "and some people brought some stuff without my permission. So yeah, I’m just not sure what it IS." He opens the fridge and picks through it. "Beer?" he offers eventually. "I might have chips somewhere. There was some kind of dip . . ."  
  
"Sure," I say, though I don’t really want it at all; alcohol just sounds like a good idea right now. It might stop the out-of-body experience, anyway. "Beer’s fine, no chips."  
  
So Jason gets me a beer and sits down across the table from me with a glass of water, and we shoot the shit. It’s funny how many people are constantly annoyed by Jason and how much he talks, because I think it’s one of the best things about him. Sure, sometimes you want to literally stuff a sock in his mouth – or maybe a pillow would be a better fit -- like when you’re trying to nap on the plane, or you’re reading a book, or actually in the middle of a conversation with somebody else. But it’s nice to talk to somebody who just makes you feel like he likes you, and who knows how to avoid what’s bugging you and make you feel better about it at the same time. I don’t think he tries to do that or even knows that he does, but he does.  
  
And it’s nice to listen to somebody talk about hockey like it isn’t ever a burden or a chore. He’s the walking definition of a hockey nerd. Even when he’s had bad times, like those awful playoffs with Jacques when I felt as if I was kicking a puppy every time I walked past Jason, looking handsome and so young in his suits for the press box, trying to be sullen and angry and instead always looking sullen and hurt. Even then that didn’t for a second affect how he felt about the game. He’s always been able to separate all of the external bullshit from the simple beauty of being on the ice; the way it feels to score a goal, or make a clean, perfect pass, or win in overtime, and I know that because of the way he talks about it. It’s a strange thing to say, but there have been times when he’s made me love the game more, too.   
  
I guess I’ve been staring at him again or something, because I didn’t notice that he went quiet, and now he’s giving me a funny look. "Are you okay? Is my hair stupid or something?" He tries to check his reflection in his glass.  
  
His hair _is_ stupid, sticking up here and matted down there, but I shake my head. "No, just thinking about how many dumb parties you’ve had here. I kind of miss that."  
  
He grimaces sympathetically. "You could still come. If I’d known you were around I would’ve called you. It’s weird without you too." He blinks a couple of times as if he regrets saying that, and stands abruptly.  
  
"So you should have another party," I say after a minute of watching him rinse his water glass as if it was accidentally filled with cement instead. He turns back to look at me. "I could hang around a while." I don’t know why I just said that; I’m supposed to be back in St-Agapit by tomorrow night. My mom’s cooking a ham. They’re planning some kind of welcome home party, I think, which is the last thing I want to deal with, but I understand what they’re thinking.  
  
"Yeah?" He turns back to face me.  
  
"Yeah, maybe," I say. It’s gotten quiet; I can hear the hum of his refrigerator, and the clock ticking on the wall out in the living room. He looks surprised and maybe confused, but before I can tell for sure he drops his eyes, and when he lifts them again there’s something more familiar in them. You know that stupid thing people always say about how the air was electric or something? I’ve never felt that, but right now I think that it might be a real thing. Even the tips of my fingers are tingling.   
  
"Cool," he says. My mouth is dry, and I’m thinking in slow-motion, and I try to skip ahead to see if I want to do this again or not. Or if I _can_ , and when I get two different answers to those questions, I take a step backwards just as he takes one forward, and reach blindly for my coat.   
  
"I mean, not right now, because I should go. But I’ll be back in a couple of weeks, if you are still in town. I have to get rid of the house." I wish I hadn’t added the last, because his gaze narrows sharply, and I feel myself turning red with something like shame. "We can hang out then, if you want. Is what I mean."  
  
He pushes his hands into his pockets and nods as if it never mattered to him one way or the other, and I breathe a little easier. "That sounds good," he says. He calls a cab for me, and stops me in the doorway when the car pulls up. "Listen . . . sorry for not calling in a while. I was going to, it was just, you know. A bit weird." I know exactly what he means.  
  
===  
  
I last exactly nine days before I’m back in Ottawa again.  
  
I thought I’d want to delay the shitty process of packing up my house, but after a few days in Quebec, talking to every relative I have and some who I’m sure were not in the family the last time I went home, I realize that I’m not used to being there so early. Usually I go back after a few weeks, when it's time to start training. I love my folks and the food is amazing, but this is overkill.   
  
When I start to get into it, I realize that I don't feel incredible nostalgia for the house the way I thought I would, probably because this is less like saying goodbye than doing a lot of in-depth cleaning. More than anything, I feel incredibly fucking bored.  
  
I call up Jason in the hopes that he'll offer to come over to help. After he spends five solid minutes talking about the weather I interrupt to tell him that, and he laughs outright at me. "Sorry, but I'd rather die than clean up my own place, let alone somebody else's. And I bet you'd just get mad because I threw out your Doritos or didn't bubble wrap your hair products or whatever. _Anyway_ ," he says loudly, to drown out my profanity, "since you whined about it and since you're here, I’m throwing that party, can you make it?"   
  
I'm surprised enough to stop yelling. "What, tonight?"  
  
"Sure, yeah, why not?"  
  
"Will anybody else be able to make it? Is anyone else even here anymore?"  
  
"Oh, sure," he says, typical unconcerned Jason. "I can definitely get enough people to show up. Don't worry about it."  
  
I don’t know if a houseful of ex-teammates is the perfect end to an exhausting day, but beer is, and there will definitely be beer, so . . . "I’ll be there. Want me to bring something?" God, I hope he says no.  
  
"Nah, just turn up whenever you want."  
  
So now I have plans, which means that I need to go get showered, which means that I don't have time to finish sorting through a mountain of old mail and takeout menus. Tragic.   
  
===  
  
I should know something's off as soon as I get there. Jason's is the only car in the driveway, and I don't even hear music, even though windows are open in the front of the house. I don't. I just assume that I'm early. Like I said: idiot.  
  
Jason opens the door before I can even ring the bell, and he's only wearing boxers. And I still don't get it.  
  
"Oh my god, am I _that_ early? You didn't say when to come over!" I check my watch; it's past 9.  
  
"No, no, you're right on time."   
  
"But . . . where is everybody else?"  
  
"They wouldn't fit."  
  
"What?"  
  
"Did I forget to tell you it was a party in my pants?" He dissolves into laughter before he’s even got the whole sentence out, that helpless, ridiculous braying, and he doesn’t stop even when I punch him swiftly in the shoulder.  
  
"You LOSER, I can't even believe you. I am so busy with the packing, and the cleaning and sorting and the, the _packing_ , and you call me over here for this!”  
  
"What! You hate all that anyways, and don’t tell me you weren’t secretly hoping that if you came by and it got late enough and everybody got wasted enough, you couldn’t get a little action in a closet." He's moving through the house deliberately, closing the windows and shutting off most of the lights.  
  
"I--" well, I can't precisely argue that. "I would hold out for the bathroom," I tell him primly, which just makes him laugh again. I still think it's crazy that we're actually talking like this, but we have snuck off like that before, so how could it be worse to talk about it? Jason's a mastermind at getting what he wants. If it were left up to me, we probably would have gotten caught by the third time. They would have made Jason get married and start having kids, and I’d probably still be buried in the AHL somewhere. But Jason's the kind of guy who would pick a game and hold a two-week tournament with anyone who wanted in: Madden or World of Warcraft or any of the NHL games or once, memorably and disastrously, Guitar Hero. He’d arrange it to be one on one, there’d be brackets just like March Madness, and the only rules were no alcohol and no outsiders allowed in at any given time, to limit distractions and excuses. I assume he actually played with everyone else –- I did, and I beat all of them, just so we’re clear –- but when Jason and I played, we spent three-quarters of the time in bed. For the rest of the time we played our scheduled match-up, because for starters, if we lied we could never agree on which of us we’d say had won. And . . . there is a great satisfaction in literally beating Spezza at his own game(s). GREAT satisfaction.   
  
The point is, some guys are good hunters, some guys cook, and some guys can build a deck in less time than I could build a nice house of cards, but Jason? Jason’s specialty is stealth sex.  
  
"You are staying, right?" He's closing in on me, the humour still sparkling in his eyes. "I can put on pants if you want me to."  
  
"Yes, but you really are going to get me alcohol. And no, I don't want you to." If he can be that blase about it, then I can too, right? I press myself against him, and he kisses me, rough and hot as always but familiar too, and the blinds are drawn and the doors are locked and there's nothing left but how good this feels. He backs me against the kitchen counter, hands tugging at my shirt, and I catch one and push it into my pants, because suddenly I don’t think I can wait. But he’s not ready to be quick and dirty because he just laughs, squeezing lightly before taking his hand away, and I watch in amazement as he sinks to his knees in front of me. He works open my jeans, tugging them down my hips with my boxers, and locks eyes with me. One hand is light on my lower back and the other is firm on my dick, and he’s taking the head into his mouth and my mind is wiped clean of everything but how fucking amazing he is. And how I’d love to spend all summer like this.  
  
===  
  
I wake up the next morning feeling as if someone dismantled me and put me back together with a few pieces missing and my head on backwards. I blink at the clock, because the room’s still dark, but it feels like morning. It’s 9:20. Thank god for heavy drapes. I definitely drank too much; there’s a sick weight in my stomach. Wait. There’s a weight ON my stomach . . .   
  
. . . Which is an arm, and it’s Jason’s, because I’m in his bed. I turn my head slowly, and yeah, there’s the rest of him, sound asleep and smiling a little, face half-buried in the pillow. I try to remember what happened, but it’s a blur: I know we had sex in the kitchen – on the floor, and I’m sure of that because I’m starting to realize it’s not my head or my stomach but my stiff, sore back that woke me up – and I know that I convinced him to drink with me, and that turned into a lot of drinks, and then . . . there’s not much after we got up here, but I remember that it went on for a long time. And we were in the shower. And I asked to sleep here. Jesus.  
  
I try to think about how to escape, but I don’t know how to get out from under his arm without waking him up. He rouses slowly while I’m still thinking about it, and I stare at him, dread knotting in my chest. I wonder if he’s going to be mad. He can’t be mad, right? He didn’t say no. He said something like ... “definitely.” Or “if you’re desperate.” He said SOMETHING that was positive, unless he didn’t say no because he didn’t want to be rude, but again, that doesn’t sound quite like Jason.   
  
He blinks slowly at me, and I want to shake him, to make him spit out whatever he’s going to say -- assuming I can hear it over the low whine of panic in my brain. "Wellllll." He draws the word out as he rolls to his side and studies me seriously. "Your hair is seriously fucking terrible in the morning."  
  
I think that I literally gasp in horror before I recover, but what I really want to do is laugh. "Yeah, well you almost cuddled me," I tell him, and when I get tired of watching the wheels in his brain turn to process that, why it’s offensive and how he should retaliate, I kiss him impulsively. His morning breath includes an unholy combination of whiskey and, I realize with a flush that I hope he doesn’t notice, me. Suddenly I feel the hangover taking a back seat to him, hardening against me, and I roll him beneath me, and we don’t get up until 3.


	4. Chapter 4

Jason leaves for Mississauga to hang out with his family, and I go back home, and spend the rest of the summer training in Quebec. In September, before the season begins, I re-sign with Columbus.   
  
I hear it from all corners. My dad’s fine with the money, but thinks I should’ve gone to free agency and signed with the Habs. (He doesn’t seem to believe that there’s a chance that they wouldn’t have wanted me. Or that I might not have needed years of therapy after I played there.) My mom thinks Ottawa might have wanted me back (and, like everyone else, doesn’t seem to believe that I actually LIKE Columbus). My friends complain that the nightlife won’t be fun when they visit (somehow forgetting that they’ve survived both Ottawa and fucking _Binghamton_ ). Even my ex, Karen, calls to tease that she’s so happy we broke up, because if she had married me and been obligated to move to Columbus, we would be divorced now.  
  
Despite what everyone thinks, I didn’t do it lightly. I would have loved to be closer to home again. And I liked the East; the travel in the West alone is brutal. But I do like it here too. We’re a young team, and we’ve got good promise, and Nash is committed to stay. And they really do want me to take the next step. I even have an ‘A’! (I’m sharing an ‘A,’ but still.) I’m playing my natural position full-time for the first time since junior. I’m on the power play. The guys are great, the GM is great, I'm comfortable in the city, and they wanted to commit to me for five years. No haggling, no threats of arbitration, no line of people ready to remind me how replaceable I am. I can finally see the upside.  
  
I’m pleasantly surprised when some other people can, too. "I’m so fucking glad you’re staying in the West," Jason says, when it’s his turn to call to 'congratulate' me. "I decided I’m gonna shoot more on the power play this year. The less good PKers over here to stop me, the better."  
  
I laugh. "You are lucky, asshole. It was still a hard decision because I know how easy it is to score short-handed against you. I could have made my career."   
  
"Ha ha, fuck off. But seriously, congratulations. Sweet contract. Just remember that if you don’t use that ‘A’ to corrupt some rookies, you’re doing it wrong. I can send you tips if you can’t remember what we got put through." If I ever forget going out for dinner with underwear on my head, it’s time to retire. "It’s just too bad . . ." He trails off.  
  
"Too bad what?"  
  
He does a terrible job of faking a cough, obviously unwilling to pursue it. "Nothing." When he speaks again, I can hear his smile over the line. "I bet it’s gonna be a good year, that’s all."  
  
===  
  
I talk to Jason constantly. He calls me after he’s dropped off the new girl he’s seeing/sleeping with (she’s a blonde in every sense of the word). He calls me before he goes to the gym, and after he runs, and when he wakes up from a nap and needs to share a dream (they should have been lifeguards but they were ZOMBIES). He calls me while he’s picking up lunch (does he want chicken in his spinach salad or not? And there aren’t too many calories in iced tea, right? And then he hangs up on me, because I tell him that what he really wants is poutine, and he should stop fighting it already). Note that "I called him" never enters into this: not that I wouldn’t, but there’s just no need. It's like . . . well, it’s a lot like being his teammate, really. I wonder which lucky bastard must be missing out for him to make time to talk to me.  
  
He doesn’t talk about visiting, or about me coming up there. I'm fine with that. We’ll see each other when I play there in November, and I’m sure we’ll catch up then. And he's one of the only people who knows that my plan to sell my house up there has been delayed indefinitely.  
  
===  
  
I think I’m losing my mind in Atlanta. When we check into the hotel, there’s a package at the front desk with my name on it. I don't know anyone in Atlanta, it's not my birthday, and it's too early for Christmas. My first thought is: bomb. My second thought is: stalker. Boll tells me to get over myself; I’m not THAT famous. I tell him he’s never witnessed the fangirls in Ottawa, but he doesn’t seem very impressed. That’s fine. _I_ know they were scary.  
  
The package isn’t ticking or covered in letters cut out of newspapers; it's just a plain old bubble envelope. So I open it. Not a bomb, but a video game. No note. It’s the newest "Call of Duty," and no one knows that I don’t already own that except . . . I had that conversation with Jason last week . . . but that’s impossible. Isn't it? Is _he_ losing his mind?   
  
When I decide that it comes out on the awesome side of crazy, I send my own purchase to his house: the fifth DVD in a porn series he's been collecting.   
  
We never discuss this, but I play the hell out of that game. And I'm sure that I hear that movie on in the background the next time he calls, which I suppose is why that conversation got filthy in a hurry.  
  
===  
  
We play in Ottawa in late November, and I’m so nervous. It’s not as if I haven’t been back, but I’ve never been back in the rink. It's been months and I still have to remind myself to walk to the visitor’s room, and my heart clenches painfully when I do. I know I’m supposed to go back down the hall and visit the guys, but it’s tough. It’s so tough.  
  
When I round the corner a bunch of the guys get up and come over to hug me (you know, manly hugs) and catch up and make jokes about my hair. (Which I do not need cut. I just GOT it cut.) Jason is one of them, talking to me as if he hasn’t heard from me in months, and it’s somehow comforting; I feel my feet back under me, conspiring with him again. He smiles, and I smile back at him, and it’s a little easier to notice that Kelly’s taken my stall, and that no one has translated anything into fake French on the whiteboard to be "funny," and that there are people in here who I barely recognize.  
  
Speaking of the barely recognizable. "Erik, you know Vermette, right?" Jason has a skinny boy by the elbow, pulling him forward to say hello, and I dimly recall him as a face from last year’s group. The name is more familiar -– Jason is always going on about Erik this or Erik that. I try not to watch their games and I just never bothered to notice who he was talking about, somehow oblivious to the fact that this exceptionally good-looking kid was the object of his attention. Something different settles in the pit of my stomach.  
  
"Oh, sort of. Hello," he says, flashing approximately one thousand perfect teeth at me, and I smile back before I can even help it. But he’s _nineteen_. I need to have some kind of conversation with Jason, who is looking at Erik as if he invented hockey tape. For starters, be less obvious. Secondly, there's skinny, and then there's too skinny. And he looks a bit like a girl. And . . . I want to knock their heads together. "I bet it is weird to come back," Erik’s saying in pristine English, pushing his too-long hair behind one ear. I just nod dumbly at him and escape to go talk to Philly, who’s waving me over to see new pictures of his kids.  
  
We lose, and I don't score, but at least I don't get booed or hit especially hard, either. I don't know what I expected, but if I'm honest, it's all anticlimactic. And there's something else niggling at the back of my mind. After the game, I leave our team dinner early and meet Jason at his house.   
  
I let go at him as soon as I’m inside, because if I wait, this conversation will never happen. "I cannot believe you’re fucking Erik Karlsson!"   
  
He stops short, my coat in his hand, frozen halfway to a hanger. "I’m _what_?"  
  
"I’m not saying it again!"  
  
"I’m not -– I’m not doing _anything_ with Karlsson!" He almost sounds offended. "What the fuck is wrong with you?"  
  
"You -- what's wrong with you? I can tell!" I, on the other hand, sound like a complete lunatic.  
  
"He’s NINETEEN!"  
  
"That’s why it is GROSS!"  
  
"But I’m NOT! What the hell?"  
  
"But he’s so, you know, he's hot!"  
  
"Do YOU want to sleep with him?" He's started to smirk. "I have his number."  
  
"NO! And then why are you always saying things like, 'Erik went to the gym with me today!' and, and, 'Erik scored a goal!'?" The longer I talk, the more I think that I probably should have put more thought into this damning case.  
  
Now he’s looking at me as if I’m a complete lunatic. "Because Erik went to the gym with me? And he scored a nice goal. And like, didn’t you SEE him? He’s ten pounds. It’s a fucking miracle that he’s going to the gym, of course I’m bragging. I mean, okay, he IS hot" and he holds up a hand as I'm about to crow triumphantly, "but not quite up my alley."   
  
I blink. "Everyone is up your alley, Jason."   
  
"I don't know." He sounds troubled. "He's just not. I'm just not -- why do you care?" he asks suddenly.  
  
"What do you mean?"  
  
"You’re flipping out because you think something’s going on with somebody else." Is he being _perceptive_ right now? Jason SPEZZA? "Why do you care so much?"  
  
I see what he’s getting at, and everything I know and trust tilts that much further off its axis. I try to think of a way to answer that that doesn’t imply anything, or mean anything, or –- worst of all -– change anything. "Why were you so excited to introduce me to him, then?" Evasion works too.  
  
"I don’t . . . because he’s a real good kid and we’re friends and I wanted him to meet you? This is dumb."  
  
"But why? Why me especially?" This _is_ dumb, it barely makes sense, but it's also working.  
  
"Because . . . because, I don’t know." And now it’s his turn to be awkward and flustered, turning away from me and making a big production of finding something on TV. "Was I supposed to pretend you weren’t there? That’s rude."  
  
I sit next to him on the couch, sneaking glances at him as he flicks through the channels. "I think maybe we should pretend this never happened."  
  
I can practically feel the tension drain out of his shoulders, and just like that he’s smiling again as he presses me backwards into the couch. "Agreed."  
  
===  
  
After November, I fly back up there a week later on the pretense of checking on my house. I tell him I’d be cool with it if he wanted to come back down when he gets a chance, and he does, twice. He stays at my place, even though he still asks if it’s okay, and I act as if it’s no big deal. I don’t tell him that I’ve discovered how good morning sex is with him. And middle-of-the-night sex. That when I tried waking him up with a blowjob, for weeks I couldn’t get the sounds he made out of my head. I definitely don’t tell him that I like the stupid way he smiles at me before he’s all the way awake, or that he makes surprisingly decent omelettes, or that it's fun to do the Jumbles with him even though we're both terrible at them, or that aside from getting caught, I can't remember what was ever so scary about staying the night with him.   
  
It’s as if my brain and the rest of me have permanently lost connection. This arrangement is crazy and stupid and we can’t keep it up, but I can’t seem to stop it, either. I guess it’s just a more complicated version of what we were doing in Ottawa, right? Friends with benefits. Travelling friends with benefits, and absurdly high phone bills.  
  



	5. Chapter 5

  
Jason fucks up his knee late in December, and is going to be out for weeks. It’s the last straw in what I know has been a building reality for him: he’s not going to be invited to the Olympics. I know that he’s devastated, but he doesn’t want to talk about it, and I don’t press him.   
  
Still, I’m glad when he suggests coming to spend a week with me while he recovers. He goes to visit Marty in Minnesota too, and goes to Florida with his family for Christmas. I assume he's not just taking pains to not be suspicious when he gets here and I know he’d call me self-centred for even considering the alternative, but with him you never can say for sure.   
  
Either way it’s a refreshing change to be able to tell my teammates that I have a houseguest, and, no surprise, he instantly gets along with all of them. When I’m not playing, we spend a lot of time playing games. We hold our own mini tournament; instead of competing against other people on one game, we’re competing against each other on practically everything I own. Variations of this scene happen all week:  
  
"Oh my god, why are you cheating?!"  
  
"I’m not cheating!" I’m getting tired of being accused of this. I can’t help it that I’m good! Or that he sucks. I mean, all right, I cheated once, but only because he went to the kitchen five times in an hour because he couldn’t get his soy milkshake the way he wanted it. That’s asking for it.  
  
Jason sits back on the couch and drops his controller to the floor, shaking his head. "There’s no way you’re beating me if you’re not cheating."  
  
"What kind of egotist are you? I ALWAYS beat you at this game!"  
  
He pauses his ranting, turning curious. "Where’d you learn the word ‘egotist’?"  
  
"From watching you!” And then, when he just crosses his arms, "from TV, of course, it always teached me way more than you losers ever did."  
  
"Taught." I give him the finger, and he continues blithely, "and I taught you the English word for 'blowjob.' I remember that! That’s probably the most important thing you ever learned."  
  
I try not to blush, but it doesn’t quite work because, well. "Jason, you taught me that by giving me one."  
  
"I know," he beams. "Who else provides that kind of personalized instruction?" He seems to forget that he’s a giant loser then, and waves for me to change out the game.  
  
And so it goes.  
  
===  
  
This carefully constructed little arrangement goes out the window when he turns up unexpectedly one night a few weeks later. I’m on my way out to buy groceries, and I jump three feet when I open the door and he’s standing on the other side of it. "Jason!" I shut the door behind him, scanning his face. "Is something wrong? I thought you were taking your new girlfriend to meet your parents!"   
  
He rubs a hand through his hair, shifting guiltily from one foot to the other. "Yeah, I was supposed to, and um. I broke up with her instead."  
  
Wow. "And now you’re here," I say blankly.  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
"To have sex with me." He flinches, but doesn’t deny it. "Tell me that is not _why_ you finished things with her.” Silence. He accidentally catches my eyes while he’s trying wildly to avoid them, and I can see that he’s miserable and confused and . . .  
  
And that’s when I completely lose it. "Okay, listen, this has to stop. I’m not going to be your –- your -- BOYFRIEND, Jason!" I can’t believe I even said that word. I feel a little bit sick.   
  
He bristles instantly. "You think I want -- I didn’t ask for that!" He sounds appalled, but I don’t trust it. "I don’t fucking want that! What does breaking up with her have to do with you? I mean, who says it has anything to do with anything? I didn’t like her!"  
  
"You said it! And you did like her! Your exact words were ‘she’s not that bright but she has a nice rack’ –- that is perfect for you!" I don't know why I'm so upset, I sort of hoped he'd break up with her and those really aren't good reasons to date someone, but. . . but. "You broke up with her and you practically just say it is about me!"  
  
"I did not, but look, if we’re gonna keep doing this, WHATEVER this is, then I can’t stay in that too because it’s just too fucking off!" He's started pacing. "You think she wasn’t gonna notice that I’m flying out of town even more than I’ve already got to? To fucking COLUMBUS?"   
  
"Well, I didn’t ask you to do that!"  
  
“Yeah, but you’ve never seemed to mind too much! And I notice you haven’t had anything going on with ANYBODY besides me in a long time.”  
  
“Who says I haven’t? I don’t tell you everything!”   
  
“I know you haven’t, and I know that you like it when I’m around, and I know that’s because something _is_ going on. Here.”  
  
And even when I tell him to go fuck himself and shut the door in his face, I know that he’s right.  
  
===  
  
We don’t talk for two weeks. Not even a text. I play and work out and sleep decently and think that it doesn’t matter because I’m obviously not even thinking about it, except that I’m thinking about it all of the time. In the middle of games I wonder what he’s doing and if he’s still mad. I watch their stupid games and he doesn’t look any different, which is exactly how it should be, but also somehow aggravates me more.   
  
I think about going out, finding someone else, just being mindless for once. Boller’s always trying to convince me to come out with him, and I think he thinks I’m secretly a eunuch. But Jason’s right; I haven’t been with anyone else in ages. I slept with two or three girls, I went on a couple of dates with a pretty brunette last month, but Jason was coming down in a few days, and when I drove her home I figured I’d be just as happy to wait for him . . .   
  
Oh, fuck.  
  
We head out on the road, and I’m just starting to feel good about my growing powers to ignore all of this when, out of the blue, there are cookies delivered to my room in Chicago. There’s no note, but I know they’re from Jason because he’s the only person who knows how much I love them. I made him sneak out with me one night last year for them, and he pretended to be mad, and he pretended he wasn’t going to forgive me for coercing him into something as scandalous and not-worth-it as cookies, but he totally ate four. And now I’m in Chicago and Jason was in Chicago a couple of days ago and there are cookies here. He is so weird.   
  
Boll shakes his head slowly when I close the door and hold up the box. "Do you have girls in every single fucking city?" I shrug, noncommittal, and offer him one. That’ll teach him to take my fangirls for granted.  
  
So I guess this is a better peace offering in Jason’s mind than picking up the phone and saying "sorry," but I know that I wasn’t about to do that either. And I guess I’ve missed hearing from him, and I think that Jason using money to buy cookies is more significant than any awkward conversation we could have slogged through on our own.   
  
Two hours later, after tracking down, calling up, and confusing the hell out of several vitamin stores in that boring-ass city, I find myself buying and express mailing a container of protein powder to Buffalo.  
  
===  
  
"I have a problem." It’s three in the morning, I’m in Dallas, and my phone woke Boll, who assures me groggily that if he wasn’t too tired to get out of bed, he’d be happy to murder me right now. Creatively. With his toothbrush.  
  
"Jason? This is not a good time. I think you are calling people in your sleep again."  
  
"No, seriously. I couldn’t sleep and I’ve been thinking, and I know you don’t want to talk about it, and I don’t really want to _talk_ about it either but I have to, okay? Because I think I want to hang out with you more. Because," and he takes a deep breath, "because I think I love you. It’s really weird." He sounds so matter-of-fact.   
  
"You do not --" I have to get up and hurry into the bathroom, because this is NOT a conversation that Boller gets to overhear. "You do not love me. Are you crazy?"  
  
"But you love me too," he says.  
  
"I definitely do not."  
  
"Yeah, you do. I was thinking about that too. There’s no other way we’d be doing this."  
  
"Jason." I sit on the tile, my back against the bathtub, and try to figure out how to convince him that this can’t happen when there’s a tiny, nagging part of me that knows this has been coming for a long time . . . that has to be ignored. "It does not work this way, okay? We cannot be a, a, couple. I already told you this."  
  
"I know, you got really mad." He stops talking for so long that I think he might have hung up on me. Finally he asks, "but why does it have to be one thing or the other?"  
  
I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to process what he’s saying over the low whine of panic that’s taken up all of the space in my head. "What do you mean?"  
  
"I mean, why does it have to be some big THING, or nothing? Obviously it can’t be like normal people, ‘cause even if it could we don’t even live in the same town, but so what? There must be something in between. Like what we’re doing now, just more often, maybe. And a bit more official. That's not that big a deal, is it?" It sounds so reasonable when he says it. So possible.   
  
I swallow hard, and again, and again until I’m sure that I can do a passable imitation of a calm person. "Jason, I have to go back to bed, and so should you. I will call you tomorrow, and I will probably pretend like this never happened, okay?"  
  
He sighs, but doesn't sound otherwise deterred. "Fine. But you'll come around, you'll see."  
  
When I hang up, go back to bed, and fail to fall asleep, I wonder if he's right. I wonder if it would be better or worse if he is. I wonder, deep down, if once again I might be more surprised by being called on what I want than I am by the fact of wanting it.  
  
===  
  
He’s going to the playoffs and I’m not. It’s hard to believe that a year ago we were in opposite situations. It’s hard to believe that it’s been an entire year, period.  
  
I don’t pick up his calls for a while, not because he’s going to brag or make me feel worse, but because he’ll work so hard not to that it’s tough to think about anything else. That doesn’t stop him from leaving me a thousand messages, most developing amazing theories about why I’m not picking up the phone, and he’s progressed from thinking that I’m seeing someone to thinking that I’ve been abducted by aliens and they’re letting me go to play games until I’m fully reprogrammed so it won’t look so suspicious. He’s pondering government involvement ( _X-Files_ must be re-airing somewhere) and is way out of his league by the time I pick up the phone.  
  
"Oh! You’re alive." He pauses. "Tell me something only you would know! That I’d know too, I mean. Unless they’ve been messing around in your memories."  
  
I sigh patiently. "You do not like ham but you secretly love bacon. You talk in your sleep. You _laugh_ in your sleep. You are afraid of snakes and still think Ray’s was trying to kill you. You own _Love Actually_ on DVD."  
  
There’s a much longer pause this time. "That fucking snake always looked extra hungry when he saw me. You know that’s true." He always looked the same to me, period, but I don’t even bother. "Okay, so. Excellent. How’re you doing?"  
  
"I’m fine. I was thinking that maybe I could come up for a while. After the playoffs, I mean."  
  
"Really?" Fucking shit-eating grin translates by phone, too.   
  
"Really, yes, shut up. It doesn’t mean anything!"  
  
"The hell it doesn’t, but good! That’s mostly what I was calling to ask anyways. And what you were wearing, that kind of thing."  
  
"JASON."  
  
"Sorry, sorry." No, he’s not. "Hey, Antoine?"  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
"That movie was a gift, all right?"  
  
===  
  
The Senators get knocked out early, but Jason takes it surprisingly well. I don't want to take credit for everything, but I assume it's at least distracting to have someone around who just kind of maybe agreed to possibly date you.  
  
If we're going to do this then we have to do it right, so I sit him down at the kitchen table, wearing what I hope is my Very Serious Business face. "Okay, so I have some terms and conditions."   
  
He frowns at me, clearly puzzled. "You what?"  
  
"You know, like a hockey contract. Except you're definitely not allowed to get Bobby Orr involved."  
  
"You wrote up a contract for our relationship?"  
  
"Yes. Well, they're more like ground rules. I'm going to add a new one right now: don't call it a 'relationship.' It's more like a 'thing.'"  
  
He plants his elbows on the table and smirks. "All right. Continue."  
  
"Okay." I straighten out my notes. "No cuddling. No flowers, ever. No nicknames. No--"  
  
"But we're HOCKEY PLAYERS," he protests.  
  
"No _pet names_." I roll my eyes. You know what I mean, dumbass. See, 'dumbass' is okay. Okay, next. You have to get used to the fact that Boll knows we're together."  
  
"Wait, what?" He sits up straighter, alarmed for the first time. "You're telling people?"  
  
"No, just him." I sigh. "I had to, because he was going to call the police because he thought I had a stalker. He's all right with it. He said you seem normal, and he already liked me, and he met a gay guy once and it was fine . . ." Jason's still staring at me in pure amazement. "Okay, forget that you know that. I'll deal with that. Okay, next, you're only allowed to call me _that_ once a year."  
  
"Call you what?" His grin is back. "My boyfriend?"  
  
"Yes. And now you're done for the year." I smirk back, but it feels forced; I'm amazed that my hands aren't shaking. "You can still send me presents, 'cause that's kind of cool, but not for Valentine's Day, because that's kind of gross. I don't think we should -- ugh, what, Jason?" He's raised his hand this time.  
  
"What about sex with other people?"  
  
Oh. I hoped I wouldn't have to consider that. "Just don't tell me about it. Or, no, _do_ tell me about it. Maybe?"  
  
"What if I just don't have it, period? Or try not to, anyway. And maybe you could too."  
  
I smile at him, feeling stupid and shy, and he smiles back. "That could solve a lot of problems. I mean, if it happens it is not the end of the world, but um, anyway, . . . right. I will not throw out any of your gross soy stuff if you promise not to throw out my chocolate milk. And we can't ever travel so much that it affects the team. And I think that's all for now."  
  
"But we _can_ travel in the summer. Together."  
  
"I -- oh. Sure. Like this summer? That would be cool."   
  
"I think so too." I notice he didn't make promises about the chocolate milk, but he kisses me, slow and warm, and I tell myself I'll bring it up later. I start to melt into him just as he murmurs, "done. Pumpkin."   
  
"JASON."   
  
===  
  
"So, here’re some plans," Jason says, and without further explanation he covers my bed with printouts. Upon closer examination they turn out to be the Jackets’ and Senators’ just-released 2010-11 schedules, and possible flights for most of the major carriers servicing Ottawa and Columbus. I try to make sense of at least a week of it before giving up.   
  
"This is insane, Jason. You want to see each other constantly? You want to fly ten times a week?"  
  
"No, no," he says patiently, taking a sheet from my hand. "Calm down. I’m just showing you what we _could_ do, in case we want to."  
  
"But you want to."  
  
"I didn’t say that."  
  
"But you WANT to."  
  
"But you do too," he says, narrowing his eyes at me, and I'm sick of him winning so many arguments by being right. It's not natural. "Not ten times a week, but a lot." He’s sitting in the middle of the floor now, with an annoyingly smug expression on his stupid face.  
  
"I KNEW it! And I do not! Jason," I shake my head, trying to be nice in the face of all of this enthusiasm. "This is like . . . I know married people who see so much less of each other than this."  
  
He visibly shudders. "You know that word's off limits too! Seriously, I’m just saying, we can do _some_ of this. We'll plan it. And it’ll be good. Wasn't I right about Hawaii? And windsurfing? And that weird beer? And eating ice cream after midnight?"  
  
"Oh, what is that saying about blind squirrels and nuts?" I knock him backwards and climb on top of him, scattering flights and matchups onto the floor. "And _I'm_ just saying that you're psychotic."  
  
"But you love me," he says cheerfully.   
  
"I tolerate you," I correct him, and when he laughs, I shut him up the best way I know how.


End file.
